Converting Negatives to CD/DVD

Hello, I am new here. I am wanting to convert my film negatives to CD/DVDs. Are there services available for this? Anybody want to recommend someplace? Thanks!

You can do this easily yourself - all you need is the right scanner. I scan negatives and slides with my scanner - it's quick and easy. Depending on how many negatives you want to scan, you can probably buy a good scanner for less than the cost of having it done professionally.

Then save your scans to DVD's (rather than CD's). They hold much more data and last much longer.

Do it yourself? Ok, can you give me an example of the kind of scanner that can do this? I am pretty good with this kind of thing, I just didn't realize a scanner could read a negative. I just need to know an example of a machine that would do this kind of thing, and I think I could go from there. Thanks.

you need to find a scanner that will scan negatives. I have a Canon Canoscan which includes the option to scan negatives and slides as well as pictures. I think certain Epson and HP scanners also have this feature.

As far as scanning to DVD versus CD... I scan to CD because Photo Industry experts that I've worked with, talked to and trust say that while DVDs do hold more, they don't necessarily last longer and aren't more durable than CDs. Also, these same people also say that the CD format is more durable than the DVD format, meaning there's a better chance of DVDs going the way of Betamax than of CDs disappearing. I back up onto both.

Great! I will look up those printers and check them out! I am not too worried about the CD/DVD debate. I copy my pictures to CD, an external hard drive, and an on line printing service, so I am fairly confident I will have a copy if I need it. Right now, I am going waay back to before digital and wanting to get all my negatives into my sets of backups and be able to make some extra prints. Thanks for all your help!

I had some film developed at a local drugstore a while back before I went digital and they said they could scan my negatives for $3 a set and give me a photo CD. I think it would be a much better way to go because their equipment is far better than my negative scanner at home. And it is well worth my time to pay someone $3 per set.

I know that Shutterfly and other such online places will do it too but I would be scared to send my negatives in the mail. I feel safer going somewhere local.

Hope this helps!

• ~ShawnaH~ Said:

Be careful with this...$3 scans aren't always the greatest resolution and places that give you $3 scans don't always employee people who know what they're doing or care what they're doing. When I was managing photo labs, I got more people crying in my store about how Walgreens or Walmart or CVS lost their negatives (and they weren't sent out, either!) or ruined their film because the associate was poorly trained and didn't care. And places that provide $3 scans don't always take the best care of their equipment, either, so you might not be getting the best scan the machine provides. Please note that this opinion is based on a decade of managing and working in (and investigating the competition) photo labs.

I just have to say that anyone that does thousands of negatives themselves is a bit nuts LOL! (said in a very funny way and not seriously)

I use Scan Cafe online. I am 100% satisfied with all of their services. They don't just scan, but do some "fixin'"

I just got a 20% off code for one friend. If you want to go online and check out their services...then if you are interested let me know and pm me your email address.

I love their service! I send them my negatives...they scan...I go through the scans online and can delete up to 50% of the scans without paying for them...then they send me only the ones I want back on dvd or cd.

I took some negatives to a professional photo shop to have them put on CD. I think it cost about $120 for 300 negatives.

• Kiber Said:

Oooooooh! Thank you for this! I do have thousands which was basically the reason for my question. Of those thousands, I am sure about half of them are throw aways! LOL. Did you dispose of your negatives after you had them put onto cds?

My scanner is an Epson Perfection 4870 Photo scanner. It is several years old, so I am sure there are updated models, but mine still works great. I scan negatives with a very high resolution.

I have an epson one and haven't tried doing this yet. I was told by a professional photographer to use cd's and not dvd's. Don't remember why.

I bought a scanner at Wallyworld that scans negatives and slides right onto your computer. It hooks in through your USB cable. I think it was around $60.

It came with editing software so you can adjust the quality and tweak as necessary.

I did a bunch of slides from the 1970s and many came out blue initially. They had lost their other pigments over the years. I was able to do auto adjusts with the software and they came out with the original colors again.

Jen

I have seen on hsn and walmart(about $70) a Slide Scanner Negative Converter I think is a good idea if you have a lot of negatives you can save a lot of money doing this yourself

One word of advice...if you are going to bring your negatives to a store for processing make SURE they label them in front of you and give you your matching tag. Last year I brought my negatives to Walgreens to develope...I figured it was safe as they process right IN the store. Well..they lost my negatives and I was out irreplaceable pictures of my kids when they were little. I made a huge stink about it..kinda felt a little bad for the manager when she offered to assist me with recreating the photo shoot. That idea got shot down cause the pictures were of my kids at ages 3 & 8 in a pumpkin field back home in New York. My kids are now 14 & 19...no pumpkin fields down here in Florida lol.

• moxiegirl23 Said:

Completely valid concerns Liz. I actually know the lab tech pretty well at this drugstore. She does all my enlargements. And I also agree that a lot of folks working in those types of labs DON'T HAVE A CLUE about photo development. A few years back my Mom managed a photo lab like that and she no absolutely nothing about it! I guess I am thinking about it as a time saver and not so much worried about the quality since they would only be used for off-site back up in worst case scenarios - fire, flood, theft. But thanks for bringing all this up, I wouldn't want someone to be disappointed.

This is a great topic. I have a lot of color negatives and color slides and black/white negatives from a trip to Africa 10 years ago. I would love to have them converted to CDs.

Has anyone ever used Wolf Camera for this purpose? Was just curious if the labs at Wolf were any better than the drugstore photo labs.

• IzzyB Said:

Wolf is. I used to work (and manage stores and labs for) for their parent company, Ritz Camera. Every associate is taught specifically how to run a lab and there are quality control checks and benchmarks that the associate has to meet in order to advance. The labs are inspected routinely to make sure that preventative maintenance is being done, and before the lab can print anyone's work, it must pass a series of daily tests. If the lab fails those tests, the lab is shut down until the problem is solved and the tests can be passed.

• swonders Said:

Yes, I threw them out. They don't "live" very long even if stored 100% right. Even after about 10 years some of my negatives were unreadable and I stored them very carefully with acid free paper between each strip and everything. So, I didn't need to keep them. After I got my DVD back I made another copy to my external harddrive.

• Kiber Said:

Yes, they can "live" a long time. there are other factors involved besides physical storage (like the acid free paper interwoven between them). Were they exposed to damp, humid areas? Was the temperature constant and within a certain range or did it fluctuate from very cold to very hot? Was this cheap film (certain store brands) or was it Kodak and Fuji (because they do last longer)?

I have 12 year old negatives sitting in a binder right now, and if I wanted to, I could take them into any lab and print copies that will look good, as if I just took the roll out of my camera. I have 20 and 30 year old negatives that I could also do the same with. Those won't look quite as good because they are older, but I would still get a more than decent photo out of them.

And when I worked in a lab with a pro darkroom in it, my Boss would routinely work with 50 year old (and older negatives).

Thank you ALL for your help. I think I am going to like this place. I got a lot of information to think about which was exactly what I was looking for.